Cougar Malaise: Have BYU Fans Fallen Off The Bandwagon?

In the wee hours of the morning on Sept. 6, 2009, close to 2,000 exuberant BYU fans showed up at the tiny Provo airport to welcome the team plane back from Dallas. Hours earlier, the omniscient Bronco Mendenhall and his band of infallible warriors had toppled mighty Oklahoma on national television. While the Cougar faithful rioted in the streets, talking heads and national pundits instantly began touting BYU as the BCS Buster to end all BCS Busters: a national championship candidate.

Fast forward exactly one month and what you'll find is alarming: Provo is once again a sleepy little town. There is no ESPN Gameday set in the parking lot outside Lavell Edwards Stadium. There are no impromptu pep rallies on campus. Local media covers BYU football without depth or passion. The NBA pre-season hasn't even started yet, but Utah Jazz guard CJ Miles' thumb injury dominates sports talk radio.

What tragedy descended upon Cougar Nation to cause this monumental malaise?

Well surely you heard the horrible news?

The Cougars lost a football game!

The Bronco Era

Remember that guy with the epic frown who coached BYU for 29 years? Remember how he won a National Championship? Remember how he won 257 games and is the third-winningest NCAA Division I football coach in history? The guy is an icon. A demi-god in football circles and a living legend in Provo. What was his name? Oh yeah, I see it there in huge letters on the side of the football stadium: Lavell Edwards.

Guess what else Lavell Edwards did?

He went 25-19-1 in his first four seasons. That's a winning percentage of .555.

In those first four seasons, he went to exactly one bowl game (BYU lost 16-3 to Oklahoma St. in the Fiesta Bowl). Edwards didn't have a team that finished ranked in the Top 25 until the end of his sixth season as coach.

By comparison, Bronco Mendenhall's record after his first 4 seasons is 38-13. That's a winning percentage of .745 and a full 13 more wins than Lavell had during his first 4 years. Moreover, BYU has gone to a bowl game in 3 of Bronco's first 4 seasons and the Cougars have finished ranked in the Top 25 in 3 out of those 4 seasons.

Those numbers are tremendous, even when compared to the venerable Lavell Edwards. Yet seemingly half of Cougar Nation is calling for Bronco's head after his team's loss to FSU this season. Sure, it was a pummeling. Sure, it cost BYU a chance to go undefeated and maybe, maybe, the chance to play in a BCS game. But is the venom against Bronco and the boys in blue warranted?

The Cougars are currently 4-1 on the season. In their three victories following the win against Oklahoma, the Cougars' average margin of victory is an astounding 29.3 points per game. They're ranked 18th in the nation and they will most likely be 6-1 when they host TCU on Oct. 24. A win over TCU, who will likely be ranked in the Top 10 at that time, will give BYU two wins over Top 10 opponents and should safely put them in position to win the MWC title and finish ranked somewhere in the Top 10 -15. Even a loss to TCU will only saddle BYU with two losses, and assuming that they take care of business the rest of the way in the MWC the Cougars would still finish the regular season 10-2. They'd be on their way to another bowl game and likely finish ranked in the Top 25 for the fourth consecutive year.

Too Much Of A Good Thing?

How much success is too much? BYU fans apparently believe that anything short of a BCS-busting run is a forgettable season. It wasn't long ago that Cougar fans were frenzied for their team after the Beck-to-Harline game (selling out the Las Vegas Bowl like it was the Beatles Resurrection Tour), and doubly delirious after Collie's fourth-and-18 miracle.

Now the Cougars topple No. 3 Oklahoma to start the season—a feat that even the most die-hard Cougar fans couldn't have imagined—and after a single loss to FSU the fans are doing swan dives and cannonballs off of the Cougar Bandwagon.

There's Life After FSU

Following the FSU debacle, the players and coaches have responded with disciplined and convincing victories against Colorado St. and Utah St. The fans inside Lavell Edwards Stadium have been less enthusiastic. At the Colorado St. game it seemed that the stands were filled with crickets. At the Utah St. game the only vocal fans were the ones naysaying Max Hall despite BYU's 35-17 thrashing of the Aggies (USU's meaningless TD in the last seconds made the score seem closer than it really was).

BYU will take care of business against UNLV and San Diego St. They will show up and play hard against TCU on October 24, and win or lose they will represent the blue and white the same way they have for the past 4 years under Bronco Mendenhall's leadership: with effort and pride.

Cougar fans with tunnel vision and an unrealistic view of BYU's place on the college football landscape are welcome to jump off the bandwagon.  But loyal Cougar fans know that being a part of Cougar Nation has more meaning than just cheering for the blue and white on Saturdays. There's a uniqueness attached to it; for better or worse, Cougar fans represent an identity that really is rooted in spirit, tradition, and honor.

It is disappointing to hear Bronco speak at the Cougar Club luncheons, lamenting the fact that his efforts and the team's results on the field are seemingly never enough for BYU fans. It would be a huge setback to the program if Bronco were to give up the stressful life of coaching, not because he failed on the field but because BYU's fickle fan base failed to support him.

There are three weeks until the Cougars play TCU in Provo. Every BYU fan needs to look himself in the mirror. There will be no room at Lavell Edwards Stadium for crickets, naysayers, or bandwagoneers when the Horned Frogs come calling on the 24th.